Alice Helena Alexandra Williams, also known as Alys Meirion,

CBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding valuable service in a wide range of useful activities. It comprises five classes of awards across both civil and military divisions, the most senior two o ...

(12 March 1863 – 15 August 1957), was a Welsh

bard In Celtic cultures, a bard is an oral repository and professional story teller, verse-maker, music composer, oral historian and genealogist, employed by a patron (such as a monarch or chieftain) to commemorate one or more of the patron's a ...

, painter, humanitarian, and voluntary welfare worker.

Life

Williams was born in Castell Deudraeth at Penrhyndeudraeth to Annie Louisa Loveday and David Williams. Her father was a Liberal Party politician and landowner. She was the youngest daughter and although her parents had liberal views she was expected to care for her mother. In 1900 her brother, Sir Arthur Osmond Williams, succeeded their father as MP and he went on to support women's suffrage. She was released from the task of caring for her mother when the latter died in 1904. Williams she set out to complete her relatively poor education with travel. She joined the Lyceum, a newly founded social club for women, in London in 1905 and went on to develop branches in Berlin that year and, in 1907, in Paris, her main home until the First World War. She exhibited her watercolours in France and in Britain. In Paris, several years later, she met Fanny Mowbray Laming, a musician and public speaker, who became her life companion. In 1914, the First World War started and during the war Williams worked for the ''French Wounded Emergency Fund''. Williams helped to create a Missing Persons Unit known as the "Signal Bureau". This earned her a Médaille de la Reconnaissance Française from the French government. Williams was the chair of one of the first British branches of the

Women's Institute The Women's Institute (WI) is a community-based organization for women in the United Kingdom, Canada, South Africa and New Zealand. The movement was founded in Stoney Creek, Ontario, Canada, by Erland and Janet Lee with Adelaide Hoodless being the ...

at Penrhyndeudraeth. This group built the first Institute Hall. In 1917, the National Federeation of Women Institutes was formed. On 16 October Lady Denman and Grace Hadow were elected chair and vice-chair and Williams was elected honorary secretary and treasurer. Williams was the only volunteer in this role as in 1918 she was replaced by a paid general secretary. She was moved to the executive committee and the following year the NFWI published its first magazine titled ''Home and Country'' and Williams was its first editor. The first edition showed the Queen visiting the W.I. exhibition. Williams was a member of and of . She wrote a play, ''Britannia'', which was staged by the

in Penrhyndeudraeth. More importantly the play was translated into Welsh by Ceridwen Peris. Williams was made a

under the name Alys Meirion. Williams' eyesight began to fail and she was blind by 1930. Williams was awarded the

in 1937.

Death

Alice Williams died in Chelsea in 1957, aged 94.Ceridwen Lloyd-Morgan, ‘Williams, Alice Helena Alexandra (1863–1957)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 200
accessed 20 Oct 2017
/ref>

Works include

* ''Aunt Mollie's Story'' (1913) * ''Britannia'' (1917) * ''Britain Awake: An Empire Pageant Play'' (1932) * ''Gossip'' (1935)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Alice 1863 births 1957 deaths People from Penrhyndeudraeth Welsh artists Bards of the Gorsedd Commanders_of_the_Order_of_the_British_Empire